Trevor Bailey obituary

Keith Miller said of Trevor Bailey, above in 1955, ‘If you could get this bloke out, the chances were you would win’. Photograph: Action Images/MSI

'Barnacle" Bailey: the alliterative sobriquet clung to him, just as did some of those too glib pejorative adjectives, such as boring, cussed, aloof, pompous and mercenary. The detractors of the Essex and England cricketer Trevor Bailey, who has died in a fire at his home aged 87, among them the bowlers who could not shift him and the spectators who lacked the imagination to find anything aesthetic in the forward defensive stroke, were a good deal less than fair to him. What they singularly failed to appreciate was that he was, in his dogged, single-minded way, one of our finest postwar all-rounders.

His stand against Australia with Willie Watson at Lord's in 1953, when the Test was saved and a significant step taken towards regaining the Ashes after almost 20 years, became one of cricket's cliches. Bailey had been anchored to the crease for 257 minutes in scoring 71. A nation listened and newspaper front pages were hastily revised. Who dares to say blocking is boring?

It was a rearguard action of heroic proportions, never pretty and at the same time exasperating to the Australian bowlers. Some of them were close to hating him – "get a move on, mate" was among the less offensive of the cynical entreaties from his impatient adversaries. Such jibes only strengthened his resolve. He would run a gloved hand with unconcern through his thick wavy hair – and continue to push every ball back, almost as if encapsulating the ritual for some soulless coaching manual. In the years that followed, he discouraged the constant, well-intentioned retelling of the innings.

There were, of course, many slow innings from him. Some seemed excessive or needless. Certainly, some were counterproductive. He argued their importance, from mid-order, to the overall shape of the match. He was a thinker, analyst and technician. Bailey possessed an attractive repertoire of shots which he had paraded successfully as a schoolboy and at Cambridge University, and was quite capable of dusting off in the championship. He scored 28 centuries in his 28,641 runs. Not all came, by any means, in that excruciating, one-paced style.

Yet that is what we remember: the 68 in seven hours, 38 minutes at Brisbane in the 1958-59 series; or his two hours over eight runs against South Africa at Leeds. The defiance at times carried a palpable psychological edge to it. "Bloody Bailey, stop crawling, let's see some cricket," the irritated Aussie crowds would chorus. And he tenaciously dropped his wide, eloquent bat on the next six deliveries.

Only in retrospect did the grudging admiration emerge. Opposing Test players acknowledged his value to England in the 1950s. Keith Miller, who groaned whenever he saw Bailey walking out, wrote a warm foreword to Jack Bailey's 1993 biography of his namesake. "Trevor was such a pain if you were playing against him – a damned nuisance in fact. You knew that if you could get this bloke out of the way, the chances were that you would win. All too frequently Ray Lindwall and I would find the task beyond us and it got under our skin."

That was his batting. As a bowler, he was well above medium-pace, able to swing away from the right-hander, to seam and "to get one to nip back". He had neither the big hands nor the big frame of a fast bowler. Off his longish run, he made the batsman play, and he retained a competitive zeal that showed in the glint of his eyes, and a set expression that rarely broke into a smile.

He took all 10 wickets for Essex in an innings at Clacton against Lancashire in the late summer of 1949. His 10-90 came off 39.4 overs, all in one day. It is perhaps mean-spirited to dally on the fact that his captain, Tom Pearce, greatly assisted the feat by eventually using unrecognised bowlers at the other end. That was still a marvellous piece of sustained swing, as early victims, including Cyril Washbrook, Winston Place and Jack Ikin were to testify. In all he took 2,082 wickets at 23.13.

Bailey had his share of injuries – and controversy. In a match against Sussex, also at Clacton, he went off for a massage after bowling a few overs. Then he came back with the intention of immediately rejoining the attack. "Hang on", said James Langridge, the Sussex skipper who went on to the field to protest. The umpires ruled against Bailey, who had to wait for an hour.

Behind that phlegmatic exterior, though, lurked a measure of mischief, often based on his willingness to confront the game's laws with as much determination as legally permissible, and reinforced by his obsessive desire to win. He was on occasion accused of time-wasting. He could be outspoken at the expense of those committee members for whom he had little time. Some of cricket's grandees were weary of him – he was too independent for their liking, too much of a "pro" when nominally an amateur.

The son of an Admiralty civil servant, Bailey went from prep school to Dulwich college, south-east London, and then into the Royal Marines with a commission, before going to St John's College, Cambridge, to read history and English. There was a brief stint of teaching, but Essex beckoned this clean-cut young man from Westcliff-on-Sea.

Bailey played for the county from 1946 until 1967. There were 482 appearances and on occasion, he seemed to be virtually carrying the side when it was short of players. From 1961 until 1966 he was the captain, leading by example. Team-mates were amused at the way he entwined himself in bandages to support his aching joints and would take the field in thick layers of MCC sweaters. Ray East recalled: "The wonder was not that he could bowl so well once warmed up, but that he could bowl at all."

Less amused were opposing batsmen, impatient at the number of practice runs he took, accompanied by cosmetic excuses when he pulled up. As an amateur he was more professional than most of his contemporaries. He was secretary of Essex from 1955 until 1967, combining that with his playing. He would often find a corner of the dressing room, while waiting to bat, to type his latest commissioned newspaper article.

Bailey's ability as a cricketer was beyond question. He played in 61 Tests between 1949 and 1959 and took 132 wickets. Early on he opened the bowling with Alec Bedser, later he was first change to Brian Statham and Frank Tyson. He toured Australia and New Zealand, the West Indies, South Africa and Australia again. He was disappointed to be overlooked for the England captaincy.

For 20 years he was cricket and football correspondent of the Financial Times. He gained a soccer blue at Cambridge and a winners' medal in the FA Amateur Cup for Walthamstow Avenue in 1952. He played at inside-forward or on the right wing, taking the corners, invariably with his socks round his ankles. He liked football almost as much as cricket and went on to become a director of Southend United FC.

When he retired from Essex, he did PR and promotional work, as well as being involved in the toy business, to supplement his commitments as a journalist and author, and as a member of the commentary team on BBC Radio's Test Match Special until 1999, where his opinions were expressed in that distinctive, authoritatively clipped voice, devoid of compromise. He had little time for cream-cake frivolity in the commentary box. He was appointed CBE in 1994.

Bailey is survived by his wife, Greta. They had two sons, Kim and Justin, and a daughter, Sharon.

• Trevor Edward Bailey, cricketer, born 3 December 1923; died 10 February 2011